Jesse McDermitt 26.Weigh Anchor by Wayne Stinnett

Author:Wayne Stinnett [Wayne Stinnett]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Down Island Press
Published: 2023-11-02T00:00:00+00:00

By mid-morning the next day, Karl had found another report from an American Coast Guard cutter that had reported sighting a submarine on the surface about twenty miles west-southwest of the Dry Tortugas, heading almost due north before submerging. They’d been returning to Key West in heavy seas when they’d sighted it.

The date and time stamp on the report showed that the sighting had been in the late evening of October 18, 1944.

The same day the powerful hurricane had made landfall in western Cuba. Paul had been researching the stories in newspaper archives, and they were compiling more information on the hurricane.

The report from the cutter reinforced Karl’s idea that the submarine had suffered damage or a malfunction to its navigation equipment, and was way off course and nowhere near where his grandfather had said they’d been when he reported being driven ashore.

“Here’s another one,” Paul said, handing Karl a sheet of paper with another latitude and longitude written on it. “The report is from a survivor near the town of Carnestown, who said his entire first floor was underwater.”

Karl entered the coordinates into his terrain-mapping software.

“This is brilliant,” Paul continued, leaning over the table. “By finding eyewitness reports and figuring out where the person was, it looks like the data we’re compiling doesn’t support where the news of the time said the storm made landfall.”

Karl looked up from the screen. “The elevation at that location is six meters above sea level.”

“Add another three for the height of the first floor,” Paul said, looking down at the paper in his hand. “Even if it were built at ground level, that’s a nine-meter surge, and farther south than where the reported landfall was. If we assume he exaggerated a little, we can call it eight meters.” Paul looked up at Karl. “And this town is more than ten kilometers from the sea.”

“Nine-point-three,” Karl said, looking up and meeting the younger man’s gaze. “From the nearest shoreline to these coordinates.”

“If a tree falls in the forest and nobody is there to hear it?” Paul asked, then came around the table and pointed at the map. “There isn’t anything there.”

“Reports from the larger settlements along the coast,” Karl said, as he turned and looked out the window, “from those towns where they thought it made landfall, all said it was a Category-2 storm, with a five-foot surge—less than two meters, barely enough to push a fishing boat onto the barrier islands.”

Paul thought for a moment. “Could it have been an American sub?”

Karl shook his head. “Even a low-ranking Coast Guard crewman would be able to tell an American submarine from a German one. By late 1944, nearly all of Germany’s were called back to protect the North Atlantic. There should have been no other in the Caribbean.”

“I’m beginning to think your idea was correct,” Paul said. “They’d misjudged their location and heading—sailing against the Gulf Stream north of Cuba.”

“All other things being the same,” Karl said, returning to his navigation map. He’d overlain

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